WAUSAU - A group of parents and community members came out in force Monday to protest the Wausau School District's new rules that allow transgender students to use the bathroom of their chosen gender — regardless of their gender at birth.

The district's rules comply with controversial federal recommendations currently tied up in court. Monday was the first time the Wausau School Board took public comment on the matter.

Guidelines on which bathrooms transgender students use could endanger students, said some parents who attended the meeting. Some opponents suggested transgender students use a gender-neutral bathroom, others said those students should use the bathroom of the sex they were born to.

One commentator said transgender people can be in danger if they're forced to use the bathroom that doesn't correspond to their chosen gender. Others opposed to the rule change worried about the safety of girls sharing bathrooms with kids born as boys.

"Our view is that boys are created boys and girls are created girls," said parent Scott Cattanach. "The transgender issue is far from required law.”

Of 15 people who spoke Monday, a dozen opposed the rule change. Some of those opponents cited their religious convictions. The Longfellow Administration Center's room was full and attendees lined the wall and spilled out the door. The majority applauded when people spoke against the rule and urged caution by the board.

No officials or commentators provided figures or estimates for the number of transgender students in the district. A June report from the Williams Institute, a think tank at the University of California Los Angeles, determined that on average one adult in every 165 is transgender in the U.S.

Former Wausau School Board President Michelle Schaefer spoke in support of the new guidelines. She reminded the board that girls' bathrooms have stalls and most students don't actually shower in school locker rooms.

"Transgender does not equal pedophile," Schaefer said. "I really think fear is driving this way more than reality."

The Wausau School District administration wrote the rules based on federal recommendations and shared the changes with the board on Aug. 22. The rules don't require board approval, said School Board President Lance Trollop. The board will revisit the rules and possibly debate and change them at the next Education/Operations Committee of the Whole meeting.

"I just would encourage everybody to continue to think about it," Trollop told the School Board. There are board members on both sides of the issue, he said.

Many people opposed to the rule asked the school board to vote on it so their opinions would be public. Opponents to the policy included a pediatrician and a licensed social worker on Monday.

The Rev. Jeff Hinds urged the school board to find some middle ground and perhaps set up gender-neutral bathrooms and locker rooms for students who don't want to use the bathroom of their sex at birth. Keeping the new rules could open the district to lawsuits or encourage some parents to pull out their children in favor of private education or homeschooling, Hinds said.

Gender neutral bathroom sign at the Rutgers University–Camden campus in New Jersey on Dec. 2, 2015.(Photo: John Ziomek/Staff Photographer)

Lawsuits are playing out around the country tied transgender-student rights and related rules.

Several states, including Wisconsin, sued the federal government for establishing the guidelines and tying them to school funding. Many Republicans at the state level see it as a federal overreach.

"As a condition of receiving federal funds, a school agrees that it will not exclude, separate, deny benefits to, or otherwise treat differently on the basis of sex any person in its educational programs or activities unless expressly authorized to do so," states the May 13 letter from the U.S. Education and Justice departments. "A school must not treat a transgender student differently from the way it treats other students of the same gender identity."